Gallagher delivers the goods in Rás

STEPHEN GALLAGHER (An Post/Sean Kelly/Martin Donnelly/ Grant Thornton) won the overall title and the national road race champion, David O’Loughlin (Pezula Racing), won the high-profile final stage of the FBD Insurance Rás in Skerries yesterday as Irish riders reclaimed control of Irish cycling’s showpiece.

The coveted title has gone abroad every year since 2004 but this year may well prove a watershed with two Irish professional teams taking part for the first time and, fittingly, sharing the glory on the last day. To add to that, there were three Irish stage winners earlier in the week and two other riders — McCann and luckless Mark Cassidy — wore the coveted yellow jersey.

Yesterday Gallagher won the overall title by a minute and 42 seconds from Roger Aiken of the Ireland National Team with British rider, Rob Partridge (Plowman Craven), who had also been hovering at the top of the general classification sheet all week, a further second back in third.

Stage victory went to O’Loughlin in a fiercely fought two-man sprint with Evan Oliphant of the British pro team Craven Plowman. Both men had been away in a four-man group for practically all of the 80-mile stage along with Blazej Janiacyzk (Poland) and the teak-tough Australian, Cameron Jennings, who is also a member of the Pezula team.

Fittingly, the whole An Post/Sean Kelly/Martin Donnelly team shared the podium along with Gallagher as they won the international team competition despite the fact that they were reduced to four men midweek when Mark Cassidy crashed out while in the yellow jersey.

“I always felt confident I could get the jersey back,” Gallagher enthused. “I think getting the jersey on the second day was always going to be more of a handicap — I was glad to be able to wear it but having it meant that I was going to be closely marked.

“When Mark crashed we had to fight to get it back but I was always quietly confident I could do it. I had great confidence in the team even though we were down to four riders.”

Gallagher, 27, from Richill in Armagh, joined the Sean Kelly Academy last year — following in the footsteps of his older brother, Keith and his father Noel, who was also an international cyclist — but he went through months of misfortune with crashes and illness.

“The last few years I have not had the best of luck with broken bones, knee injuries, tendonitis and illness,” he said.

“But everything has come right now and it doesn’t often happen that way in cycling.”

Daniel Lloyd got back into contention in Clonmel on Friday and then, on Saturday, Paudie O’Brien and Benny de Schrooder, were in a 14-man break from the outset.

Once Gallagher got across with Lloyd, they proceeded to drive Gallagher back into the lead, with Simon Richardson, the leader by 10 seconds, Ciaran Power, Chris Newton and David O’Loughlin all abandoning their hopes of outright victory in the Wicklow mountains.

Yesterday O’Loughlin, who was second into Skibbereen after puncturing near the finish on Thursday, was back to claim what was his second ever Rás stage victory and make up for all the other disappointments.